


The House In Barcelona

by NadiasGhost



Category: Hetalia: Axis Powers
Genre: Angst, Fluff, M/M, Pining, because there were no romantic feelings on Toni's part until lovino was an older teen/adult, but i acknowledge its weird to write for a fandom, but spain's not even here yet, flashbacks to Lovino's childhood, i just like the description words i used in this ok, im not gonna tag this as underage, lovino's massive crush on Toni, shhhh i don't know which one, spamano - Freeform, there's.... a war going on, with child and adult versions of characters
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-15
Updated: 2018-03-15
Packaged: 2019-03-31 22:09:23
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,215
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13984344
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NadiasGhost/pseuds/NadiasGhost
Summary: In the quiet in betweens while Antonio is away and Lovino is still hanging around in Spain for reasons he just can't explain there are moments too empty, when Antonio is away fighting, and he has the audacity to order Lovino to stay within the estate. Where it's safe. Like Lovi is still a kid.**Lovino finds himself running away to Antonio's empty vacation house, on the waterfront in Barcelona, and hiding there to watch old memories replay.





	The House In Barcelona

**Author's Note:**

> loosely based off one of my chapters from "The Yearly Retreat" but you don't need to read that first--  
> Lovino is like 19 in this, maybe early 20s, but he's acting?? like a petulant child?? because?? that's canon??  
> **  
> I dunno what this is, guys. I was going to keep going and have some conclusion but then I got bored of it as a project and decided to just post what I had

“Master Vargas--!” 

Lovino whirled on the servant, biting out, “don’t call me Master if you’re going to continue treating me like a child!” 

“Master Vargas, please! You leave for days on end, you tell not a soul where you are going! Even you must know how dangerous that is! We are at war!”

Lovino continued to walk away from the servant, even as he called after him from the manor’s steps. 

“-- And Master Carriedo said specifically that--!” 

Lovino whirled around again. “Master Carriedo is the last person I will be taking orders from! He left us!”

**

Lovino shook away the shouting match of this morning, and hastened towards the building at the end of the privately owned street. He was in Barcelona, the familiar humid breeze rolling off the ocean and into his lungs. 

Thunder cracked overhead, and he jogged up the steps to the front door of the beachhouse as the first raindrops soaked into the fabric of his shirt. 

The entrance way met him with a familiar rush of warmth and the smell of old wood, and old books, and the linens soap that Antonio liked. 

Though the house hadn’t been heated in nearly two months, Antonio had designed the house to collect sun off the sand and waves from the east all morning, and even on rainy days the ground floor held that warmth through to midnight. 

Lovino took off his shoes out of habit, and went directly for the kitchen. As he did he could see Antonio in the entrance way, barely a young man but more of a tall and lanky boy, slipping off a rain jacket to reveal a shirt that was also soaked through. He could see Antonio shaking out a smaller rain jacket, Lovino’s, and laughing down at him as he complained about the rain in his shoes. 

“Come now, Lovi! Stop moving! You’re getting mud all over the floor!” 

“Yeah?! Well you were the one who wanted to go for a walk in the RAIN! It’s your own damn fault!” 

He could hear Antonio’s surprised laugh, feeling him sitting a young Lovino down and pulling off his muddy boots with a sad plopping sound. 

“But it was so fun! We jumped in puddles!” Antonio protested. “You jumped in puddles,” Lovino had protested weakly, hanging his head a little because he had-- in fact-- jumped in a puddle or too as well, and had-- in fact-- quite enjoyed it. 

He could see Antonio laughing carelessly, and picking young Lovino up so his feet wouldn’t get wet all over again, walking the both of them to the kitchen. 

“Come on, Lovi. I’ll make you some hot cocoa and we’ll warm right up--”

Lovino had pulled all the ingredients for cocoa down before he’d even registered doing so, and was humming under his breath as he filled a pot with clean water. Stupid Antonio. Leaving him alone to be bored…. And worry about him. And miss him. And-- 

Lovino shook the thoughts from his mind. There was no denying the one thing he wanted more than anything else in the world was for the very Spaniard in question to walk through the front door, shake the rain from his hair, slip off his boots, and pad softly into the kitchen. 

For him to wrap his arms around Lovino from behind and hold him tightly. He’d say something sappy and typical, like “I missed you so much Lovino.” And for once Lovino wouldn’t shrug him off, he’d grab at his hands and wind his arms tighter, because this was his goddamn daydream, and he didn’t have to worry about how Antonio was treating him differently as they both got older, or how Antonio himself was different now, with this stupid fucking war--

Lovino began to aggressively cut at the block of chocolate he had, chipping it away into smaller pieces. He threw it and the spices into the pot of water, and made for the french inspired double doors leading to the beach. 

He threw a door open-- fuck Antonio, the bastard could pay to replace the damn thing if it got broken by the wind-- and stood in the doorway, letting the heat from the house mix with the stinging cold of the winter rain. God, it must be miserable on the front. 

And Lovino was stuck here. Alone. Not because Antonio and his new soldier friends wanted to keep him safe, oh no. Because they viewed Lovino as a liability, a child. 

Lovino cursed under his breath. In Italian, in English, in Spanish, hell, even in German, which proved exactly how much time he’d been spending with his brother and his stupid lover, what with Antonio gone. 

He stepped out fully into the rain, still cursing, and uprooted the outdoor chairs and table, flinging them on their sides into the sand. He punched at the door, and a small panel of the decorative glass broke, but the rest held strong, stronger than Lovi’s bleeding knuckles. He turned from the deck, and french doors, slamming the open door as he did, and made for the trees along the beachline. 

The only thing he’d left unshattered was the perennial flowers planter, which was mostly weeds, but also some Spanish flowers, which Antonio had painstakingly arraigned at some point, years ago. 

As Lovino reached the first tree, he kicked it, hard. Hard enough to bruise his foot badly. He thought at first he had broken it. But as he sank to the sand he recognized this particular tree, and felt sorry for chipping its base. 

He sank into the tree as he descended, supporting his back on its firm bark. He could see sun, the summer sun of Barcelona, as it beat down from above. He could hear Antonio calling something playful to him from the shoreline, as the waves crashed behind him. 

He could feel the sun of his skin, and the sand under his hands, a he sat curled against this tree with a book, calling back to Toni that there was no way in hell he was swimming, it was still too cold. It was a lie of course, the sun was hot, but he wanted to wait for Toni to drag him in. It was this strange roundabout game with them, it always had been, and it always would be. 

He could hear Antonio’s delighted laugh, and his own shocked screech as the Spaniard dumped a bucket of freezing ocean water on him, and then sprinted back towards the waves…. 

Lovino stumbled numbly back into the house, wiping rain from his eyes. He took the cocoa off the stove and poured it, almost into two cups before he realized he only needed one, and put Toni’s back into the cupboard. He shuffled with the hot cup in his hands past his own old room, to Antonio’s old room. 

There he found the walk in closet, and began to riffle through for dry clothes. 

Antonio had caught him in here, once, on their last visit. It had been during the late fall then, not at all vacationing time, but Antonio was worn thin, having stretched himself too far for too long, and wanted time away. He had packed the night before he intended to leave for the house in Barcelona, and had only allowed Lovino to accompany him when Lovino had asked. 

Like the younger boy was an afterthought. 

They had been growing farther and farther apart, the two of them. Lovino was rapidly becoming less of a teenager and more of a young man, with his own opinions (not that he hadn’t been strongly opinionated before). And Antonio was engulfed in his work leading Spain, the country that never seemed to cease being on the brink of something-- be that something good or bad. The rollercoaster of emotions took a toll on the both of them. And though Toni was still Toni-- same laugh, same stupid jokes, same habits-- though Lovino knew him inside and out, he felt like the Spaniard was treating him differently somehow. As though growing up meant that he would want less attention from Antonio. 

On the contrary. As they both became more busy, more stressed, the only thing that kept Lovi sane was spending time with Antonio. Because they knew each other. Inside and out. 

Antonio had gone to the store on their first day there to stock the kitchen with groceries-- alone. Without Lovino. Somehow, Lovino had found himself in that old walk in closet, running his hands over old but familiar fabrics. 

He remembers, even now, thinking at the time: “Toni won’t be home for another half-hour. What’s the harm in trying them on.” Not only did the rarity of the clothes draw him in, it was the history he had with them. He’d looked up to Antonio as he changed through their years, and for Lovino these clothes were power, security, and confidence. 

He tried on a few of the shirts, only to find them too long in the sleeves. Not because Lovino was a child, but because he simply had a smaller frame than Antonio. He had frowned at the knowledge that he would never quite fit these clothes, never quite measure up to Antonio in that literal sense, and had continued digging. 

Until he found a box with relics from the age of piracy in spain. He’d slipped on the high waisted pants eagerly, then the ruffled, faded lace-up shirt. He’d marveled at how rough and textured the material was, compared to Antonio’s later years of lace and silk and gold adornments, and then had slung the wide leather belt with a holster for a pirates pistol over his skinny hips. He’d smiled, twirling for the mirror, even as the belt slipped off one hip and slung itself low over his thigh. 

As he’d grabbed up the wide-brimmed hat and pulled it on, Antonio found him, walking into the closet with a puzzled look. “Lovino? Did you not hear me calling? I’m back, we can cook!”

Lovino whirled to the sound of his voice, blushing. The sleeves on the shirt were too long. The cut of it was made for somebody with broad shoulders, and it slipped off one of Lovino’s. The belt was comically large, and the hat fell in his eyes. He felt like he’d been caught playing dress up. 

Great. He knew Antonio would never chastise him for messing with his belongings, but as the Spaniard’s eyes grew wide, Lovino waited to be cooed at and called a child. He’d been working so hard to make Antonio view him as an adult, an equal, and now that was all going to be thrown away because of this stupid old shirt and its stupid, too-long sleeves.

But instead of poking fun, Antonio just stared for another long moment, before clearing his throat. “What?” Lovino demanded, ready-- as always-- for a fight. 

“You just…. Look very grown up in that, Lovi.”

Now it was Lovino’s turn to stare. Antonio approached him slowly, and rolled each of the sleeves on the pirating shirt, until they rested just below Lovino’s elbows. He then re-threaded the belt through belt-loops Lovino had missed on the pants, and stepped back, silent. 

Lovino twirled again for the mirror, though he was red from the tips of his ears to his chest. 

“You would’ve made a handsome pirate, Lovi,” Antonio laughed, though there was something different in his voice. 

….

Now Lovino was all too glad to find something with sleeves that were too long, it would give his hands something to ball up and hold onto. He slipped easily out of everything wet from the rain, and into the softest boxers and sleep shorts he could find. He sighed, rolling his eyes. Antonio wore nothing but shorts to bed, even through the winter, and many nights he could be found covered in blankets and shivering, but refusing to wear anything warmer. 

For a moment Lovino paused, blushing at thinking about Antonio in bed, and blushing at the realization that he’d tugged on somebody else’s boxers without a second thought. But he was too tired to seriously trace that line of thinking, and the flush soon faded, replaced with a dull pang of longing. 

He tugged on the softest-- and largest-- cotton button-up he could find, but left it unbuttoned, as he truly was quite numb and a) didn’t feel at all cold, and b) had fingers too stiff and unfeeling to do the small buttons. 

He pulled the comforter from Antonio’s bed, and wrapped himself in it, enveloping himself in the smell of Antonio’s favourite linen soap, and garden dirt, and the sunshine it was last dried outside in, and the smell of Antonio himself. 

He placed the cocoa above him, and climbed the ladder to the attic, smiling when he heard the rain on the roof. 

It felt safe. He curled up with one of the books that was scattered on the floor of the attic, one of the ones Antonio used to read to him, with his excitable but somehow also gentle voice that would do all the characters…. 

Soon Lovino was lost to the rain on the roof and the smell of Antonio all wrapped up around him and sleep.


End file.
